Trigger warning: implied child abuse
Cardross Scotland, June 8, 2002
"Yes, now I want you to concentrate on this next part. You've been able to summon concentrated sunlight for a few weeks already but today I'd like you to expand on that, quite literally. Expand the range of the rays, see how bright you can make it. This spell will serve you well when fighting off Vampires."
Veronica watched as Margaret stood up from her seat at the end of the table and went straight for the whiteboard in the far corner of the room. Veronica watched her Watcher wheel the board over so that it was just across the table from the Potential. The woman picked up a marker and circled a few phrases on the board with enthusiasm.
"Meditation and Concentration." She read each phrase aloud as she circled the words with red. "Core Manipulation." She leaned over to the unmarked section of the board and wrote down her next phrase. "Magical Intent." The Watcher recapped the marker and dropped it down onto the desk that separated her from the young Witch.
She looked down at the ball of light hovering between the girl's two hands. The woman leaned over the desk, palms flat against the dark wood and smiled down at her charge. The glow from the orb of light cast a golden sheen over the woman's features. "You have a rare type of magic, Veronica. And I think it's finally time that we begin to hone these special abilities that you possess. Don't you?"
They'd been focusing on the theoretical side of magic for the past two months. Different classes of magic, magic users and power sources and the differences between them, the strengths and weaknesses. Theories on changing spell outcomes without having to physically change the spell itself.
Veronica understood the concept of what her Watcher wanted her to do, she just wasn't sure she would be able to do it. Margaret Price had been training the young Potential in witchcraft for the past year. The woman wasn't a Witch herself, but she had studied Magical Theory for the last decade of her life. The woman had worked with multiple covens across the globe in different branches of magic and specialties.
The training started with basic spell casting. She'd already learned about brewing and magical artifacts from Watcher Blake but the man wasn't as knowledgeable in the magical aspects as Margaret was. The man could have easily taught an average Potential all she needed to know, but he was fairly ill prepared for one that was also a Witch. Therefore the Council thought it best if a different Watcher take over Veronica's magical education, while the regular Slayer training continued with Blake.
The first few months were all about memorizing spells and hand movements, combining the power of the spells with artifacts, rituals or runes and a lot of practice.
So much practice.
Both magical and physical.
Watcher Blake didn't seem to like the fact that he'd been asked to back off the magical side of her training. He never voiced his feelings, he was too proud. Instead Veronica's physical training was doubled in intensity. She was pushed to run faster and longer, fight faster and better, hours on end until he was satisfied. And he never was.
The magical training also wore her out. It both physically and magically exhausted her. Margaret never pushed Veronica too hard. She always stopped the sessions when Veronica energy seemed to wane.
Blake had no qualms about pushing Veronica past her limits. Often he would seek her out after her sessions with Margaret and make her spar before bed.
Veronica didn't fall asleep most nights, instead she would pass out as soon as she made it to her bed. The exhaustion would claim her before she wanted it to.
The Potential ate like mad in order to keep up with all the training. She assumed that it was some kind of increased durability as a Potential or a Witch that kept her going.
She knew that she couldn't keep it up for much longer. She could feel the ache in her arms even then as she cradled the ball of light in her hands.
She was tired. She'd been tired for the past year, but she could take the exhaustion that raked her body so long as she was able to keep using her powers. The magic lessons were one of the few things in her life that she actually enjoyed.
The power that flowed through her veins and swelled within her chest always made her feel warm. As close to happy as she'd ever been.
She was tired, but ready to try out what they'd been discussing for the past week.
"Yes. I think I'm ready." Veronica gave the older woman a tentative nod.
"Good. I thought so. It's why I came prepared." The Watcher reached into her blazer and pulled out two pairs of sunglasses.
She smiled as she leaned over to slip a pair over the girl's face, making sure they were secured behind her ears and then slipping on her own.
"Okay so let's begin."
—
Hawkins Indiana, August 19th, 1983
Veronica had never really had many friends.
While under the original Watchers Council she only ever really interacted with Watchers. When she was younger she would train with other young Potentials but they never even spoke to each other. Their Watchers made sure that the contact between the girls was limited to sparring matches only. The closest thing she'd had to a conversation to a child her age had been when they traded blows. A warcry here, a grunt there. That was it.
Her time spent with the Devon Coven had been the first time she'd been in the company of someone that wasn't directly under the Council's domain. She'd spent about a week with the Coven, learning what they were willing to teach her before Giles had come to them for help searching out the other Potentials.
He'd been surprised to find a Potential already in their care, but took it in stride as they both headed out to find the others before the Harbingers found them. Giles had been rattled at having such a young travel partner but found common ground in the few novels he'd taken with him on his trip. Veronica had spent most of the time before Sunnydale reading the novels he'd brought along, finding the pages a lot more interesting than the girls they'd picked up on the way.
Looking back now, Veronica could see that she had been the one that had put up barriers first. The older Potentials had been unfocused and whiny, but it wasn't their fault. They'd been ripped from their homes, told that they were in danger and meant to save the world, and left in the hands of strangers. It was all new to them, even the ones that had had Watchers before. They'd been trained, but they didn't live and breathe under the Watchers Council's eyes. For Veronica it was all old news, been there and done that. She was just bitter that the other girls had more freedom than she'd had. That they had people who seemed to care about their wellbeing training them for battle. She'd found their attitude ungrateful and unappreciative of what they had compared to what they could have had. What Veronica endured for ten years.
Faith had understood that bitter part of her, had recognized it from the beginning. Faith had a similar relationship with Buffy. Faith knew where Veronica was coming from and that allowed the young Potential to open up to her in a way that she'd never allowed herself to with others. Veronica could tell that Faith had a hard and dark past, she could sense it like Faith sensed hers. Like called to like.
Faith had been Veronica's only confidant. She'd found friends in the others, what little of them she'd actually allowed to befriend her. But she could literally count the number of people she considered friends on both hands and still have fingers left to spare.
But that was back in her old world.
Here she was more open to friendly acquaintances. She had friends in the sense that she had people that she had allowed to talk to her. She never allowed them to breach her inner walls though. Never allowed them to breach the surface of her true self.
She hadn't expected to allow anyone close here in Hawkins either. But she wasn't in a big city anymore. She couldn't hide by herself in the crowd. Her tendency towards being a loner would single her out in a way she didn't need at the moment. This was the place where it was all going to go down. She didn't need to be a Cordy, she just needed to be somewhere the original Scoobies ranked. Connected enough to be in the know when anything weird was going on and unacknowledged enough to be ignored when she was the one doing weird stuff.
She wasn't allowed the chance though because she'd been blacklisted before she'd even stepped foot into her first class.
Veronica had been enrolled at Hawkins Middle for less than a week. That first day had set the president of how her social life in Hawkins would play out. To say it was lacking would be an understatement.
No one talked to her. Yes, she was grateful to be spared the effort. But it sort of ruined her plan to stay below the radar.
Teachers tended to take notice when a student is singled out by the entire eighth grade class. And she did mean the entire class. No one spoke to her. They all actively avoided her during class and breaks.
One girl actually dropped a pencil and when Veronica leaned over to pick it up and give it back to her she acted like the Slayer wasn't even there. She just sat staring straight ahead, hands balled up into fists as the kids behind them looked on. The girl ended up missing out on taking notes for the rest of that class because she wouldn't accept Veronica's gesture and also refused to ask anyone else.
That was dedication.
She was impressed by the pull that the Neanderthal actually had. When he said that he could make her regret her actions he actually meant it. Too bad she actually didn't give a fuck whether these kids liked her or not.
She was impressed by the effort they took to keep the whole thing going. Whether they avoided her out of spite, solidarity or fear, it didn't matter. Sure, it would make group projects awkward, but it was no skin off her back.
It would have been easier to float somewhere in between, more convenient, but not a necessity. She could play the role of social outcast, a violent one at that. She could pull off the Bender look. She did have a plaid shirt in her closet, maybe she could make herself a pair of fingerless gloves.
The point was, she didn't regret her actions.
She despised bullies and abusers. She hated them with a passion. It reminded her of her time under Watcher Blake and how weak she had been. How she never fought back.
So, yes. She'd fight James Dante again if she could have a do over. Though she would definitely take the time to break something besides his nose though. She wished she hadn't pulled her punches quite so much.
Will and his friends made it a point to seek her out during the breaks. She felt guilty but she avoided them the best she could.
Will seemed like a sweet kid. His friends too. She just knew that he was going to be involved in some supernatural type stuff soon. She had to get a read on him and the situation first.
Veronica, on that first day of school, had hesitated. It was something that she was actively trained not to do. She never hesitated. She was the one that jumped into action at a moments notice. It was Slayer intuition and the lifelong training that had her always at the ready for whatever life threw at her.
She had seen the asshole push Will to the ground.
She'd jumped off her bike and made to jump in and save the boy before anything even happened. It was a Slayer's instinct to protect those who need protecting. But she actively stopped herself from storming in to save the day.
She needed to know who this boy was, what his role in what was coming would be and what he was capable of.
Veronica knew that something supernatural lived within Hawkins. She needed to see if this boy was what she had detected on the map. If the bully attacked him and he was somehow stopped in an odd mystical way, then she would at least know if the boy had some powers.
Will didn't stop the attack. He hunched in on himself under the bully's attention, he flinched at every move the older boy made. And it made her physically sick to just stand there and watch. So she stepped in and defended him.
He wasn't really hurt. He'd just been dragged around a little, pushed a couple of times. It wasn't that bad.
She had vivid flashbacks of Watcher Blake tearing apart her room during routine inspections and how he would grab her by the chin or the back of her neck with tight bruising fingers.
Not that bad my ass.
She tried to justify her actions in telling herself that at least she now knew that Will was just a normal boy.
She fought with herself all morning until noon.
She'd decided to buy him lunch to make up for her earlier hesitation and create an opportunity to do one last check.
She could hear them before she even saw them. It was her Slayer ability but amplified a little with her magic. She upped the power as soon as she left the cafeteria, weeding through the chatter and keeping an ear out for Will Byers in particular.
She heard a mention of DnD and zoned in on the sounds in that area. She could hear Will's voice arguing with his friends. Apparently there was doubt in the encounter, and of her DnD knowledge which was random. She shut down the super ears and headed toward the direction she'd heard the voices.
When meeting his friends she pretended like she didn't know his name either, though she'd actually gotten a really good look at his class schedule so she actually knew his first and last name, date of birth and school ID number.
While talking to them she decided to do her final check. She hid the glow of her eyes with a slow blink and cast a small glamour over her eyes, making sure that they still looked brown to everyone else.
Her magic was often an extension of herself. In this world it had to be. There was no magic in the air or earth, only within herself. So she'd had to learn to really hone her powers. The lessons with her Watchers really helped in figuring out how to push the magic from her body, sometimes to affect the physical realm and other times the metaphysical.
Souls, magic, auras and energy. These things were metaphysical. There but not here. Real but intangible until one willed it so.
She pushed her magic outward, invisible smokey fingers of gold extended out and wrapped around Will. They coiled around his form and sunk into his skin searching for and finding his core. Which surprised her.
Everyone living has a soul, even gingers and even some vampires. But not everyone had a magical core. All supernatural beings had magical cores: Slayers, Demons, Witches, etc. But it was actually quite rare for normal humans to have one. Those who did were usually Witches but some never possessed the ability to become one, not fully anyway. They were just magically inclined. Sensitive. Mediums.
Will had a magical core, but definitely one incapable of actual magic. His core was small and translucent, just barely there, almost on the verge of nonexistent. He wasn't a Warlock or anything but he might have been a Medium.
Her magic brushed against his core. Will visibly shivered but it didn't really register with him. He was definitely sensitive to her magic. He looked at her with open honest eyes. She liked to think that she was good at reading people. He could feel her magic when it brushed his, but he was definitely unaware of its existence.
She'd decided to leave now that she'd gotten her answers and eased her conscience. She'd turned down the offer to eat with them but couldn't resist asking Will what his DnD character was.
She'd chosen the Paladin because it felt the closest to who she was as a Slayer and a Witch. She wondered how accurate Will's own character was to what she knew him to be.
Cleric.
Was that his sensitivity? His magic unconsciously declaring itself? Sometimes Veronica just knew things. It was the intuition that came with being both a Slayer and a Witch. Like the way animals knew to migrate or birds to fly. Will's alter ego was a magic user because he unconsciously knew that that was true.
She dropped a few more DnD bombs before she left. She did know the game, at least enough to play, and she didn't like when her abilities were doubted.
She needed to scry for that magic source now that she knew it wasn't Will. His essence was too weak to ping on the map like the one from the night before, there was still something else out there. And she had to find out what.
The rest of the week she'd declined the offers she received from he and his friends to sit with them. Veronica honestly preferred the bleachers and sitting alone, but the disappointment in his face and the curiosity in his friends' made her almost want to say yes.
It seemed even the years below her had also taken notice of her new found social pariah status. The younger years sort of looked at Veronica in fear. Apparently the rumors that spread were a lot more vicious than what actually happened.
The Slayer had overheard some interesting takes on the incident and what had actually happened. There were rumors that Veronica had pulled a knife out on the bully, or that she had just attacked him for no reason at all, or that she just flew at him in a rage shouting in Spanish or tongues or something.
Yes, Veronica was most definitely capable of doing whatever they all accused her of, but it wasn't like she was going to do any of that stuff at school. Not on the first day, at least.
She just saw something in Will that needed protecting.
She could see the kindness Will, and the vulnerability too. And she could tell that it was all genuine. She decided that he wasn't what was coming, he wouldn't be the cause of it at least. She assumed he was probably just going to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Either that or targeted because he was magically inclined.
Veronica imagined Will going up against a Vampire, or a Werewolf, or a Haxil Beast. It wasn't hard to imagine the carnage that would ensue.
She'd just have to put a stop to whatever was coming before it got to him.
This led her to semi-stalking Will Byers for the rest of that first week.
Afterschool he biked to a friend's house, all of the boys did. She rode back to Marianne's not long after getting to these homes, she didn't want to be caught by the neighbors or the boys. She also didn't want to raise any suspicions with Marianne.
Three different houses in three different days. None of them his. She knew this because she'd never seen an older teenage boy in any of these houses. Will had told Veronica that he had an older brother.
On the fourth day of school, and her fourth day of being a creep, Will was dropped off at school by said brother in an old Ford. She couldn't follow the car without either falling behind or being seen in the car's mirrors. So she just rode home that day.
Which brought her to today.
Will decided to ride home by himself. She followed him at a distance. He rode down Cornwallis and stopped where the street met Kerley. Veronica could see Marianne's place from where she was, Will was straddling his bike just a few feet from where she slept.
He looked both ways at the stop sign before hopping back on. Veronica thought he was probably going to continue down Cornwallis because she knew he didn't live on the same street as she did.
He didn't.
Instead he turned onto a path where the two met. One that was sometimes gated off. He rode straight into the forest. And in the direction she knew that concentration of magic lay.
She'd repeated the little ritual a few times over the course of the past four days. Her sitting alone at lunch came in handy for this reason. Each time the grains tainted with her blood would pool in the same exact spot on the map. It didn't matter the time of day or day of the week. The energy was always in the same exact spot.
The part of the forest that Will just rode into.
Veronica didn't follow him.
Instead she laid her bike by the side of the road, not far from her own window. She walked to the gate, letting her fingers glide across the gaps in the wire as she made her way to the farthest side where the foliage was thick.
Veronica stopped at a few branches blocking a portion of the chain links. She quickly pushed them aside to see two signs strapped down to the gate.
HNL
Hawkins National Laboratory
U.S. Department of Energy
Restricted Area
No Trespassing
U.S. Government Property
"It's the government. It's always the fucking government."
Veronica ran back to her bike, and let herself into Marianne's. The woman was gone at the moment, Veronica wasn't sure where.
She flew through the house and stopped at her desk. She riffled through the drawer and pulled out the map she'd borrowed from Marianne's dining room shelves.
She found Kerley on the map, found Cornwallis, but couldn't find the road that Will had just rode down. She couldn't find a Lab or any sort of landmark within that area of the forest either.
Her map was out of date.
Rookie mistake.
The map had been torn along a single side, and apparently that side had held the date of creation.
She remembered him and his friends coming from the same road the day she first saw him, her very first day in Hawkins. She'd been so focused on the pull and Will that she hadn't really bothered with their surroundings.
Her lack of vigilance aside, the road wasn't on the map. So she guessed it was where she would start her search. She wouldn't have the time to find an updated map without raising questions. So she decided she was going in blind.
Veronica emptied out her backpack on the bed, spilling her books and pens all over the blue comforter. She grabbed the mason jar on her dresser, the red salt crystals for her ritual hidden in plain sight. She packed that in her bag, along with a bottle of water and a few other things she'd thought she might need.
She ran outside hopped onto her bike and rode down that same unnamed path that Will did.
—
Veronica was able to follow the road until she found what she was looking for. She'd reached a hill in the road and once she reached the top she found the lab. The building was huge, maybe six stories high, in the shape of a giant 'x'. It was surrounded by barbed wire gates and forest, there was nothing around for another half mile or so probably. There were tanks and satellites everywhere and that was just from what she could see.
It probably had a giant underground secret basement where all the experiments happened. Demon summoning, robo-demon engineering, human sacrifices, animal testing. All that good stuff.
The red salt grains were in her bag but she didn't need them. She knew that this was the place. She could feel it.
Power. Magic. Rolling across her skin, sending a shiver down her spine. It was almost like being in the presence of another Witch.
It wasn't Will. She'd watched him ride past the building with ease. Veronica assumed he lived somewhere beyond the woods that surrounded this place. Besides the fact that this power felt too strong to be Will, this feeling wasn't the usual ache in the pit of her stomach that she always felt in his presence. It wasn't that pull from Death or the Powers or whatever.
This was raw magic. A powerful Witch or Warlock.
And they were actively using their magic for something. Veronica could feel the magic pulse and flare out from wherever the source was in the building. It was like some kind of radar. Flaring out. Reaching. Searching.
And the young Slayer-Witch could feel her magic swell in response.
Whoever this was, they were powerful. That or they were using some sort of ritual or object to amplify their power. But this wasn't her old world. There wasn't gems and artifacts lying around soaked in mystical energy ready to be used. This person was Willow level powerful.
Veronica eyed the huge satellite dishes that littered the roof of the compound.
But then again, they were in a government laboratory. It wouldn't be the first time science had meddled where it shouldn't. Maybe they were testing the extent of someone's or something's powers. Experimenting on a magical being or artifact. Using these monster satellites to amplify that reach.
The Witch tightened her hands on the handlebars of her bike. Her eyes glowed gold and a burst of her own magic left her. She willed her magic to seek out that source of power she'd been feeling. She felt it push outward, toward the lab. And then down, way down.
She couldn't see the inside of the building or even the path her magic took. She could just feel the essence of herself, of her magic, and feel its movement as it searched. She could feel it rush forward and turn and fall with every room in came upon and every floor it descended, it was like being on a rollercoaster; her gut tingled with every sharp move her magic took.
And then she found it.
That thing that she'd tracked on the map, and felt pulse against her skin just a few minutes earlier.
It wasn't an object like she had secretly hoped. It was a person. She could feel their presence. Feel her magical core, really. And it was a 'her'. And she was young. And cold. And scared.
Veronica willed her magic further. She wanted to know this powerful being. Know what she was feeling and what she was casting. Her magic brushed across the girl's core.
She saw her golden wisps of magic caressing a core of blue and green. It was all metaphysical but she knew it was real. The cloudy tendrils of blue and green magic, like living ocean water reaching for her own sunlit magic.
They connected.
And another wave of magic poured out from the building. This time it was like a literal wave. Veronica staggered off the seat of her bike. Cold washed over her, and she felt the sting of pain and fear wash over her. Panic bloomed in her chest. Not from her but from the girl in the lab.
She could feel the girl's panic and fear from where she stood. Veronica opened her eyes, just realizing that she had closed them in the process of her metaphysical search. And when she opened them she saw nothing but blackness.
Where she stood in the middle of the road on the hill above the lab, was not what she saw. There was no lab in the distance. No woods around her. No fading sun beyond the tree line.
Veronica could feel the bike's handles beneath her hands but she could see nothing but darkness around her.
She was seeing what the girl saw, she was in her head. She'd wanted to know what the girl's magic was doing. Now she was seeing it through the girl's own eyes.
Growling and clicking rang through the darkness. The girl's head swung to find the source of the sound. Veronica's own head stayed in place. It was an odd sensation to have her vision blur and her view shift without physically moving her own head or eyes.
There was nothing but blackness. Animalistic gurgling broke a moment of silence. The girl took a couple steps back. Black water was revealed at her feet, cold and licking across her bare ankles.
Whatever was in the darkness moved closer. Veronica could hear the water splash in its wake. It growled and whined. It was like something out of an alien movie.
Or something out of a Hellmouth.
The girl bolted. Veronica didn't get a chance to see the thing that lurked in the dark void. But she knew it was a demon. The girl ran and Veronica tightened her hold on her bike, anchoring herself to her physical body as her mind explored the girl's.
The growling was getting louder. Veronica could feel the panic and fear rise. The girl had been scared when she'd heard what was in the dark, but as it chased after her it became unbearable.
Veronica heard her heartbeat loud in her ears, and at this point she wasn't sure if it was hers or the girl's. Her breath came short and she wanted to run herself, but she locked her body tight, not wanting to run off into the forest blindly as her mind ran from the demon with the girl.
It was all so confusing. She couldn't tell the difference between herself and the girl. Was it her fear? The girl's panic? Both? Neither? She needed out.
She tried to focus through the confusing tangle of emotions and thoughts. She gathered her magic. Those wisps of golden light that had fused with the girl's cool core and pulled.
She could hear the girl's screams. She could see that she was no longer in that dark void. But she was now surrounded by water. Murky water, bubbling from the thrashing and screams. She wasn't sure whose screams they were.
She was still in the girl's mind.
Veronica yanked at her magic again as they both screamed. White hot pain shot through her head. Like someone was driving a stake through her skull.
Their cores had wrapped themselves around each other, their individual auras of magic creating a beautiful marblesque orb. Separating the two halves was painful. They clung to each other as she pulled.
As she detangled their minds the connection between them was still open. Some of the girl's thoughts filtered through to Veronica along with the emotions. It was all garbled Russian and English she couldn't make out most of it. The only thing she could make out was one word repeated over and over until Veronica finally pulled free completely.
Papa!
Veronica snapped back into her own body. She dropped the bike and opened her eyes to bright lights. She screamed, or she continued to scream. She didn't think she'd ever stopped screaming in sync with the girl in the lab.
She threw her hands up to block out the blinding lights.
—
Cardross Scotland, July 10, 2002
"Brilliant, Veronica. Absolutely brilliant!" Her Watcher laughed with glee as she stood behind her, watching as Veronica shot beams of sunlight from her hands. The rays were so bright that the two were both wearing solar viewing glasses to shield from the brightness and possible radiation. Her Watcher was even wearing a special vest to block out radiation.
Over the course of the last month the two had made great progress with the sun spell. Veronica was now able to manipulate the spell in a multitude of ways: summoning a ball of light, manipulating the shape and reach of the light, generating heat, increasing the intensity.
There'd been several different experiments but this one was actually kind of exciting to the Potential. Veronica was projecting powerful rays at different panels designed to absorb different frequencies of light while her Watcher went around the room with a thermometer and a radiation detector.
They'd been going at it for about two hours. Testing the limits of her control. Raising and lowering the temperature and radiation levels. Testing her focus and concentration while holding the spell. And seeing how long she could keep it going.
It was reaching the ten minute mark.
Her heart was beating fast and she felt warm all over. Not hot as in she was boiling her insides- it was a legitimate fear- but like she'd just run a mile in the middle of the night.
She looked like she'd just ran a mile. Sweat made her curls stick to her face and the nape of her neck. Her breathing was starting to become ragged and her limbs were beginning to tremble.
She didn't know how much longer she could hold it for.
"Amazing! Absolutely no detection of radiation output or rise in temperature. It's as if you're doing nothing at all. You've really gotten a handle on your control."
The praise almost made Veronica want to smile. Almost being the operative word. Though she liked Margaret enough, and the woman was kind to her, she knew that she could never trust the woman completely.
Margaret Price saw the bruises that littered her body. She noticed the way she'd half drag herself upstairs to bed every night. She knew why Veronica's face would suddenly go blank and her speech became monosyllabic when her fellow Watcher entered the same room as them.
Veronica noticed that the woman made sure to be extra kind to her after she'd witness proof of Blake's malice. But she also noticed that the woman hardly lost any sleep over what she saw on a daily basis.
She knew that Blake hated the girl but she knew that there was nothing that she could do.
She was considered a Junior Watcher. The only reason that she'd been assigned to a Potential was because Veronica was special. Margaret just happened to write her dissertation on Magical Theory and had a degree in several science fields that tied in with the subject.
But at the rate the Veronica was progressing she wouldn't need much guidance in the magical portion of her training for long.
Margaret knew that she reported to Blake. He was a senior Watcher and had trained several Slayers previously. Successful Slayers. He was trusted by the Council. He was a traditionalist. And he made sure to only physically harm her while they were on the sparring mat.
Margaret couldn't claim abuse when it was hidden behind training, Veronica knew that. She still wished that the woman would interfere. But she knew that she couldn't, not without losing her position.
And of course her job was more important than the well being of a child.
No. Veronica wasn't bitter about it at all. The only reason the young Witch even remotely agreed with Margaret's silence was that if the woman was fired Veronica would be alone with Blake again.
The Witch didn't want that. Not at all. So she accepted Margaret's kindness with a grain of salt.
Veronica shook her head, trying to physically clear her mind of her thoughts. The brightness of the beams had dimmed a bit due to her lack of focus. "I don't think I can hold it for much longer."
Veronica could see her Watcher fiddle with the strap around her neck. "Alright, you're right. I think that's enough for today." Veronica reigned in her power, letting the sunlight sleep back into her palms. She let her arms drop as soon as her Watcher gave her the okay.
"Beautiful. That is the longest one so far." She took the stopwatch from around her neck and showed the screen to the girl.
15:38.07
"Fifteen minutes and thirty eight seconds." The woman slipped out of the vest and began to fiddle with the monitors connected with the panels they'd used as targets. "I'll go over the data tomorrow morning."
Veronica took the time to wipe the sweat off her face. She grabbed a water bottle from the table in the corner and poured half the thing down her throat and the rest across her head. The chill of the water cooled down her flushed skin and quenched a thirst she didn't even know she had.
She grabbed the towel she'd brought down with her and patted her face dry. The towel was plush. It reminded her of her blankets. She couldn't wait to go to bed.
"Veronica?"
The Potential pulled the cloth away from her face so she could see her Watcher. "Yes?" The woman had set everything down on the table next to Veronica's things.
"I just wanted to say that I'm proud of your progress. This was all just theoretical. Witches three times your age couldn't even dream of attempting the things that your doing right now. You'll be ready to use this out in the field in no time at all."
"That's good to hear." Both women froze at the sound of a third voice. They both looked toward the stairs to see Watcher Blake standing at the bottom of the steps.
"Why is that?" Margaret turned to fully face the man as Veronica turned her back to them both.
"Excellent question, Watcher Price." Veronica could hear his trademark Oxfords tap against the concrete floor as he made his way further into the room. "It seems that there are Vampires in town."
Veronica could feel her whole body go tense.
No.
She wasn't ready yet. Sure she had the spell down but that didn't mean that she was ready to actually put it in action. She was ten. Ten. How was she supposed to fight off a real life Vampire and survive? And he'd actually said 'Vampires'. Plural.
"You can't mean that!" Margaret shouted at the man. "She hasn't- she can't! We haven't tested her ability to perform the spell under pressure yet! And- and there are too many variables unknown! We need to see whether she is capable of casting during a fight! How she does with moving targets, multiple targets! No! She- we need more time."
"Well we don't have any time left. There have been four bodies found, completely drained of blood and experienced post-mortem tearing at the jugular. The victims were all abducted not too far from each other, meaning that they were most likely attacked near the Vampires' feeding ground. Four bodies in two nights and those are just the ones they found missing in Cardross. I haven't even checked the body count from Argyll or Bute." Blake's whole speech sounded like a sneer, she could picture his scowling face narrowing his eyes at her turned back.
A hand clamped down onto her shoulder. Roughly. "We leave in an hour. I believe they're hiding out in St. Peter's Seminary. The place is exposed to light during the day, no walls, so I don't believe they're nesting there. It's just where they like to feed. We go now while we know where they are."
There was more arguing about the pros and cons but Veronica blocked it all out. She knew she was going regardless of what Margaret said. The woman wasn't in charge here. Blake was. And he'd already made up his mind.
"I'll do it." Both of the adults stopped fighting with each other and turned to stare at her. "There's no other choice, right?" She looked the man dead in the eye. "I'm going to die anyway right? A painful and cruel death? Might as well be now. Get it over with."
This would be the first time she'd put any of her training to actual use. She wasn't sure she'd survive the experience. But Veronica would fight with all she had. Of that she was sure.
Blake matched up the stairs and went off to prepare the car for the hunt. Veronica stayed behind with the female Watcher as she watched him go.
"You don't have to do this. There is no way he ran this by the Council. I can call them and-" Margaret reached out to the girl to calm her, console her, whatever. Veronica wasn't going to let that happen.
"Don't bloody touch me!" She flinched back from the woman's hand. "You can't do shit!" She practically spit the words at the shocked Watcher.
"I'm only trying to help you." The woman held her hands out in front of her, placating the girl.
"Yeah, well don't. You only make things worse. You see how he takes it out on me when you try to help. I can see the guilt in you eyes every time you see a bruise or a cut. You coddling me only makes it worse. How fucking niave can you be?!"
"Hey! Don't talk to me like that." The woman pointed her finger in the girl's face, a reprimand.
"Then stop acting like a child. Your actions have consequences, consequences that affect others. The bruises that you like to stare so sadly at? Those are the results of your actions. You trying to tell Blake 'no'? Only made him rejoice in his decision even more. But that's fine. I don't need to be coddled by you. I don't need your protection. I'm not a child. I'm a survivor. I've survived ten years with the Devil. A few low level Demons can't beat that. Either I slay these Vampires or I die trying. I win in either scenario."
The woman was speechless. Veronica was wasting time arguing with her anyway. She had a fight to prepare for. She rushed up the stairs but paused at the top step.
"Watcher Price?" The woman looked up at her with wet eyes. Veronica hadn't called her by her official title since the day they'd met. She could tell by the look on her face that the Watcher knew what that meant. The relationship would be professional from there on out.
The older woman cleared her throat before answering the Potential. "Yes, Miss Hernandez?"
"I hope you sleep well tonight."
—
She didn't.
She didn't go to bed at all that night.
Not until the two came back from the hunt. And even then she couldn't find it in her to actually sleep. Not when she kept seeing the image of the Potential reentering the house behind her eyelids.
Dressed in dark clothes from head to toe. Clothes torn all across her body, blood soaking the front of her shirt, or what was left of it. Blood smeared across her face and on her hands. Hair short and uneven and muddy, like it had been viciously hacked off during the fight. A large nasty looking wound at her base of her neck, where her throat met her clavicle. It was half torn and half bubbly like she'd been shredded apart by claws and branded in the same spot.
She looked like she'd just walked out of a massacre. Six Vampires, she'd later learned. The girl had fought off six vampires, only taking out half with the sun spell they'd been practicing. And she'd only used the spell as a last result.
She'd used it to finish them off when they'd had her pinned, quite literally, to the edge of an open stairway dangling head first off the third floor.
But it wasn't even the blood or the wounds that kept her from sleeping. It was the dead look on the girl's face. It wasn't the carefully blank mask she always wore around Watcher Blake, it was just empty. Void of everything that made her Veronica.
It was the dead expression and the bright glowing golden eyes that stared her straight in the eyes.
Those eyes haunted her sleep.
She filed for a relocation not long after the incident.
She wasn't missed.